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Getting Shirty - Goalkeeper shirt History
By Neil Andrews
In the early history of the game, teams were identified by the colours of their caps and socks or simply by armbands. But by the time the first ever FA Cup Final was played in 1872, teams had adopted their own distinctive strips and team colours, which in many cases have remained essentially the same ever since
Strict rules governed what was and what wasn't permissible in terms of colours and patterns. Goalkeepers in particular, until the rules were relaxed in the 1970s, were limited to green, blue, scarlet and white tops except for international matches, where yellow was the colour of choice. Green proved most popular simply because of the law of averages - very few teams wore green as their first strip. But it wasn't until the turn of the century that goalkeepers began to take on a separate identity. Indeed, prior to the First World War, the only way a goalie was distinguishable from his teammates was by the fact that he wore a cap on his head - although it must be said that in 1909 Scottish goalkeepers were instructed to wear different coloured jersey from the rest of their teammates.
Early goalkeeper shirts often came in two forms. The first resembled a tight fitting undershirt or long-sleeved vest can often be seen in early photographs, usually being worn by the legendary Billy "Fatty" Foulke. The second was the more traditional woolly polo neck sweater. This heavy-looking thing became commonplace during the cold winter months and only really died out in the early sixties, when fashion dictated that a more athletic jersey should be worn. These light cotton garments were already popular on the continent but it wouldn't be the last time British football was slow on the uptake.
Goalkeepers were also a bit behind the times when it came to wearing a number on the back. It was always assumed that the goalie wore the number one shirt, even if in reality he didn't. He didn't need to, really. The colour of his shirt told you where he'd be playing that afternoon. Squad numbers were originally introduced as a way of identifying the players more than anything and although goalies traditionally wear the number one there's no law in the game to say an outfield player cannot wear that number. Indeed, former Tottenham Hotspur favourite Ossie Ardiles wore the number one shirt for Argentina during the 1982 World Cup Finals.
And he's not the only one. Alonso wore the same shirt for Argentina during the 1978 tournament while Dutch striker Ruud Geels wore the number one shirt in 1974 after both squads were numbered alphabetically. Closer to home, defender Stuart Balmer was given the same number when Charlton Athletic first listed their squad in the early 1990s.
The earliest record of numbered shirts being worn dates from the 1922/23 American Soccer League season when a team from St. Louis by the name of Scullin Steel wore numbers on the back of their tops for the 1923 Challenge Cup Final. Back home in Britain, numbered shirts didn't appear until August 1928 when Arsenal and Chelsea ran out for the new season, but that little experiment only lasted two League games and they didn't become compulory until 1939, although the experiment was repeated again for the 1933 FA Cup Final. However, on this occasion instead of both sides wearing one to eleven, the two teams were numbered from one to twenty two. Everton's goalie had the honour of wearing the Number 1 shirt while his opposite number in the Manchester City goal had to make do with the Number 22 shirt!
At international level, they first appeared in 1937, when England wore numbers on the back of their shirts for their game against Scotland at Hampden Park. The following year numbered shirts made their first appearace at the World Cup finals in France. Sixteen years later, teams competing in the 1954 Finals in Switzerland were obliged to assign a unique 'squad number' for each player although their names would not appear on the back of their shirts until the 1992 European Championships held in Sweden (although Scotland did experiment with this idea in the early 1980s).
Until the mid-nineties, goalkeepers traditionally wore the same shorts and socks as their colleagues. There were exceptions. In the early 1970s England legend Peter Shilton famously wore an all-white strip until he was beaten by a long-range shot during a mid-week match - apparently Shilton's kit was too reflective under the floodlights, making it easier for opposition forwards to pick their spot. Conversely, Eastern European goalkeepers, such as the Soviet Union's Lev Yashin and Hungary's Gyula Grosics, favoured an intimidating all-black strip. These days, goalkeepers are willing to sport all manner of lurid concoctions. None more so than Mexico's flamboyant goalie-cum-centre forward Jorge Campos.
But not all keepers are happy with their kits. David Seaman in particular was less than overawed at the all-red strip that made him look like "a packet of sweets" while former England goalie Chris Woods was once forced to wear lilac socks when playing for Sheffield Wednesday. Others have taken a dislike to their shirts purely for superstitious reasons. Arsenal goalies, for example, never wear a new shirt unless it has been washed. This practice dates back to 1927 and the FA Cup Final after Gunners keeper Dan Lewis blamed his slippery new jersey for his failure to save the goal that spelled defeat.
Shirty Tales
Ayr United's Hugh Sproat had a novel way of winding up fans of the two Auld Firm clubs in Scotland. If Ayr were playing Rangers, he'd wear a green top, but if The Honest Men were playing Celtic, he purposely pull on a blue jersey just to get them
Welsh internationl Leigh Richmond Roose caused a similar stir when he played as a guest for Port Vale in a reserves game against his former club Stoke City in 1910. Roose insisted on playing in his old Stoke City shirt and annoyed the opposition fans further by the turning in a Man-of-the-Match performance. The game ended in a riot.
Roose also insisted on wearing the same undershirt for every game - an old black-and-green Aberystwyth top - which was never washed for fear of bad luck.
French goalkeeper Fabien Barthez is often credited for the introduction of short-sleeved goalkeeping tops into the modern game, which he first wore along with fellow keeper Pascal Olmeta during his time at Marsaille.
Dutch goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar has a collection of jerseys worn by some of the great goalies of the game.
Saint-Étienne goalkeeper Jérémie Janot is known throughout France for his hatred of Olympique Lyonnais, traditional rivals of the club with whom he has played most of career, and once attempted to celebrate Lyon's exit from Europe at the hands of AC Milan by wearing a Milan kit while turning out for Saint-Étienne the following weekend.
When Croatian keeper Dražen Ladic played his 59th and final game for his country against France in 2000, he symbolically wore the number 59 on the back of his shirt.
Bill Lloyd was once ordered to change his jersey before a league match in the 1950s after the referee complained it wasn't a regulation colour. According to reports, the former Millwall keeper had decided to wear something that bore more resemblence to something his grandmother had knitted rather than a traditional goalkeeper shirt
This article comes from
http://www.goalkeepersaredifferent.com/keeper/shirtframe.htm
International Kits
about 11 years ago
Interesting article. But why and when were goalkeepers allowed to wear short sleeves? I was once told that they had to wear long sleeves - and of a different colour from their team-mates and opponents. This was so that referees could more easily tell that if a hand or arm touched the ball in the penalty area whether it was a lega lmove by a goalkeeper as opposed to an infringement by a non-goalkeeper.
I don\'t think the law\'s been officially changed, but it dates back to when goalkeepers didn\'t wear gloves. It made the ref\'s life easier to see if there was a handball in the area.
When playing for Sheffield United, did fatty foulke ever wear any shirt other than the red and white stripes? All the old photographs that I have seen show only stripes.
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